 Have you ever wondered what One Piece would be like in real life? Well, me neither, but it is happening on Netflix in a time period that I'm going to describe as eventually, so I guess we'll see how that goes. Hello and welcome to the Grand Line review your source for everything One Piece. My name is Liam and this is my oversized border collie puck. Say hello, puck. And today we are here to talk about inspiration, a very important topic for each and every person thing in existence because wouldn't it be amazing if we knew what inspired the most successful mangaka of all time. Etura Oda is often praised as some sort of God-like entity possessing a mind of infinite creativity that no filthy mortal swine could ever hope to rival. However, that impression exists because whether you realize it or not, Oda borrows and sometimes even outright steals a lot from the work of others. And if you don't believe me, then let me introduce you to this particular Hugo Boss model. Now, to the best of my knowledge, he doesn't have a name, but we're going to go ahead and call him Paulie because Oda pretty much ripped this man's visage straight out of a magazine and plonked him down on water seven. Of course, not every, how shall we say, inspiration is as one to one as this model, but even if it is, I'm not necessarily implying that stealing is a bad thing. You may have heard the following quote at some point in your lives, good artist borrower, great artist, steal. That was a favorite quote of Steve Jobs who stole it from public Picasso. Who stole it from Igor Stravinsky? Who stole it from T.S. Eliot? And let's be real, he probably stole it from someone as well because stealing stuff is the entire history of the arts. Now, with that said, there are right ways to steal and there are definitely wrong ways to steal and it generally comes down to what you do with that element and how you build on it. And as we're going to see, Oda uses theft in all of the right ways. And as an example, we're going to kick things off with a quick round of real life one piece and very simple mini game, the rules of which are as follows. I am going to present you with three real life figures and it is going to be your job to tell me which one of them Oda took and turned into a one piece character. Now, should you guess incorrectly, then your punishment will be to subscribe to the ground line review which will also result in consistent injections of one piece culture administered straight into your YouTube feed. And if you are correct, then you yourself will become a one piece character or maybe you already are. But here we have Darrell Hanna, Freddie Mercury or Bob Marley. One of these people did become a legit one piece character, so which is it? Make your choice now and we shall reveal the answer in three, two, one, and bam, it was Freddie Mercury who served as the inspiration for Peppy Lulu of the Galila Company. So if you guessed incorrectly, then you know a thing to do and please do say hi in the comments below if you are a new member of the Grand Fleet, welcome. Just to touch on the other two figures though, they were not chosen at random. They're more to serve as an example of something to watch out for which is the internet in general. It's a dangerous and misleading place, especially when it comes to allegations regarding one piece. There are a lot and I mean a lot of compilations of real life figures who inspired one piece characters allegedly, but most of them are horrendously incorrect. For example, it's a very popular trend to state that Bob Marley inspired Yasop and the Darrell Hanna's character in Kill Bill is the model for Hina because of this one particular shot. Although it gets even stupider because Hina was first introduced in 2001 which was two years before Kill Bill was even released. So you know, we do need to be a bit more discerning with these things. And I guess what I'm trying to say is don't just believe everything that a strange Australian man tells you on the internet. Now with that said, we're going to start with Mr. Super himself, Frankie. This one is more akin to the Hugo Boss example where Oda very boldly took a unique look in media and transformed him into a scantily clad cyborg. And in this case, it would be Ace Ventura, pet detective played by one Jim Carrey. The most striking feature is of course the hairstyle. Frankie's pre-timescape look mimics and extends the effect as well as the sunglasses and the Hawaiian shirt. Look, it's just all there. And this is also a great example of what I mean by stealing doesn't matter as much as what you do with the elements you take. Because Frankie, even with these very distinct and obviously lifted elements is still very much his own character. And intriguingly enough, many of Frankie's post-timescape hairstyles have also taken inspiration from Ace Ventura or other Jim Carrey characters. Many, but definitely not all. By the way, a controversial question here. What is your favorite Frankie hairstyle? Just putting all my cards on the table here. I'm going to go with gun head from Dress Rosa. That thing is so good. Before we move on from Jim Carrey, though it's also a very standard internet-y thing to do, to attribute Bon Clay's design as being lifted from Jim Carrey's character in Dumb and Dumber. Which chronologically, he's sure it does work, but it's a bit of a stretch. However, if true, it would be amazingly appropriate because in the anime, both Frankie and Bon Clay have the same voice actor being Kazukiya. So if both of them came from the same figure of inspiration, then this would just be absurdly appropriate. All right, now let's do what nobody wants to do ever and get political. Diving into the Gorose or the Five Elder Stars, the Five Elders, I don't care whatever you prefer, they all draw heavy inspiration from former world leaders. It's also very interesting because they don't have names yet. So I very much take into referring to them by their inspirational namesake. I mean, for example, this guy here, that is Samurai Gandhi. Meanwhile, this dude, Brat, is Gorbachev. In fact, he's the clearest inspiration of any of them because Oda has even chosen to replicate Mikhail Gorbachev's trademark Port Wine Stain of the Head. And the other three are not quite as straightforward, but they are commonly attributed to being as inspired by Abraham Lincoln, Itagaki Taizuke, and Karl Marx, which I can definitely see just, you know, not as clearly. And I think this is where we may get into the territory of digging for deeper meaning where there may not necessarily be any. It's hard to blame people for doing that though, because Oda does take a whole ton, including the visual concept of Mask of Soldier Killer, whose mask is ever so clearly based on those of Daft Punk. And apparently Daft Punk were actually pretty big in Japan, mostly due to their film Interstellar 5 5 5 5, which is, that's four fives actually, that is so frustrating, it should be five fives. In any case, that film was produced by Toei Animation, who you may or may not know produced a certain series called One Piece. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that if they ever wanted to, you could probably make a Toei cinematic universe where the straw hat pirates encountered Daft Punk. Oh, and also this is a thing, in case you didn't know, Killer can actually eat through the holes of his mask, although he is restricted to very thin food. So we're mainly talking like, like a lot of spaghetti. Wait a minute, what spaghetti? It's Italian. And what else is Italian? Italian names. And who has Italian names? Well, several people, but Steve Buscemi specifically comes to mind. And who is Steve Buscemi in One Piece? Sanji. This is a very fun one, because it's one of the few design inspirations that has been confirmed directly by Oda, which is that Sanji's whole aesthetic is based on the character of Mr. Pink from Reservoir Dogs. Very intriguing because prior to this, it was more popularized of a thought that Sanji was based on a more typically handsome Hollywood actor with the word Dick in his name. That's right, it was Leonardo Dick Aprior, specifically from the Romeo and Juliet era of his career. But in the SPS of volume 68, Oda revealed that it wasn't just the aesthetic similarity, but that he also tried to have Mr. Pink's mannerisms and vibes portrayed within Sanji, which I personally think is infinitely cooler than basing him off to Caprio. And it explains a lot because Mr. Pink, you know, he's cool and all, but he's also kind of a joke. And there's even an extension of inspiration here because all of Sanji's siblings are assigned a specific color, just like the Reservoir Dogs characters, although that's almost certainly a coincidence and more to do with the Super Sentai inspiration. Now, Emporia Ivankov is probably the one character in The One Piece, whose inspiration is the most clear and undeniable, being Tim Curry's Frank Inferter from the Rocky Horror Picture Show. And here Oda has once again basically just stolen a design, made it a bit taller, made it a lot wider, slapped a new name on top and said, good to go. And this is one of those situations where even if you've never seen Rocky Horror on stage or the film, you will still immediately recognize this because the Frank Inferter imagery is just that iconic in the Western media landscape. Ivankov is not the only one though because his newcomer second in Commander Nazima's design is also quite similar to the outfits used during the Time Warp scene in the Rocky Horror Picture Show, combining flamboyant, formal wear with sunglasses. In fact, many of the newcomer designs very much just exaggerated Time Warp dances. Going back to Ivankov though, I would be remiss not to mention that while his aesthetics were very Frank Inferter in construction, his characteristics were actually inspired by Norio Imamura, a self-professed real life of Kamma who used to be a member of an acting troupe with Luffy's voice actor, Miami Tanaka. And not only that, but Imamura was actually the voice of Ivankov for a while until the things and he got canceled because of the things. And we've explored a few of these so far, but Oda takes a lot of inspiration from the world of music, a lot of visual elements to be precise, and one artist who has managed to feature not only once, but twice in the world of One Piece would be Steven Tyler, the front man of Erasmith. He was used as a partial model for the hypnotist Django, but his likeness was also basically copied and pasted for Diamante during Dressrosa, along with that whole rock star Persona Flair. But I did say partial inspiration for Django because he also derives a lot of his general existence from Michael Jackson, of course, and he may not be the only one either. Because of all of the character things, Hody Jones may also be constructed with a certain degree of Jackson Flair, although this is another one of those situations where this is hard to attribute it with any kind of certainty, because they basically just both share the trademark, Jackson curly strand of hair, and that's about it. Oh, and they both like to wear hats. That's a defining characteristic. Meanwhile, another intriguing rumor is a very well-known comparison between NL and the rapper Eminem, which I only bring up because if I don't, then I'm sure you will will in the comments. But resemblance aside, there has never been any official connection to Eminem. Although Oda is a confirmed Eminem fan, and I personally think the likelihood is quite strong, especially considering the character of NL does actually rap his song on the One Piece Island song collection. It's quite something. I can't play it here for obvious copyright reasons, but if you thought that NL was awesome before, just wait until you hear them rap a God skills. And remaining in music in other classic fan comparison is the idea that Gem A.K. Mr. Five borrows a lot from Lenny Kravitz. And as for his partner Ms. Valentine, she is generally considered to have been inspired by Twiggy, a very prominent model slash singer of the allegedly glorious swinging 60s. I say allegedly because I was not there to confirm this. Of course, we also have the admirals. Each one of them is based on a very well-known Japanese actor. With Kuzan, his likeness is taken from Yusaka Matsuda, probably best known for appearing in the Detective Story TV series. In Kizara's case, it would be Kunie Tanaka, who actually had a character named Borsolino in the film Trucchiato, a film which just so happened to star Bunta Sugawara, who you probably recognize already as Sakazuki. He is an extraordinarily prolific actor whose complete list of filmography is comparable to the idea of just sitting down and reading the dictionary. And of course, we have Fujitora, who is very much modded after Shintarokatsu, and specifically his Zatoichi character. And with all of this in mind, we should very much expect Ryukugi or Green Bull to follow this trend. Although as of right now, there is only speculation as to which real I figure he may be. Now there's also a very interesting case online with Trafalgar Law with a lot of fans claiming that they've figured out his aesthetic origins, which allegedly lie in Valentino Rossi. And there is an exceptionally convincing image online showing the two side-by-side with Valentino in this bright yellow outfit very much mimicking the colors of the heart pirates in addition to just, you know, looking like law. Although one problem with this is that it's actually a Photoshopped image to add in that little chin beard because in the original picture, Valentino has no such beard. Meanwhile, other compelling evidence includes finding a picture of Valentino once sitting like Law hunched forward with his hands together, which is, uh... Is it possible that he inspired Trafalgar Law? Maybe. Is it likely? Almost certainly not. But we now come to white beard. He has a lot of popular comparisons, a predominant one being Hulk Hogan. However, we do actually know his direct inspiration and sadly we don't have an image of this individual in question. But white beard was modeled rather simply after an owner of a bar where Oda used to drink in her various meetings at. And this bar owner made such a strong impression on Oda that he decided to incorporate this man into the character of white beard, one of the more prolific existences in One Piece, which makes me really want to meet this guy because he does sound larger than life. Although sadly, the owner passed away in 2007. But it just goes to show that it's not all about taking reference from famous media. Sure, a lot of One Piece has very clear roots in almost every artistic medium imaginable. Be it film, music, photography, architecture, things, whatever, pretty pictures, pretty people, ugly people, whatever. But what Oda does can very much be summed up as him borrowing directly from life. He takes what this world has to offer and just morphs it into the thing that is One Piece, which is important to understand because it isn't just pure imagination. In fact, I would say that Oda has a lot less imagination than he does just plain attention to detail to the world around him. It means that he doesn't have to spend time and effort creating new cultures, new designs, new personalities, and all that stuff entirely from scratch. At his disposal is an entire rich and detailed world that already exists. So you know what? Why not make use of it? And if you'd like to make use of yourself, then next up we have a very challenging video going through the self-professed, most difficult One Piece quiz in existence. Are you up to the task? Well, even if you're not, do it anyway. Peer pressure. I look forward to seeing you there.